Posts Tagged ‘crap’

Another day of Z2 was planned today. For those that may not know, Z2 is riding at below 75% of my FTP – in my case I’m able to ride at 210 watts and stay in my Z2 – unfortunately today I went outside of that number and was closer to 220 watts for my ride today. Couple that with an extra 20 minutes (110 minutes total today) and I could possibly be a bit tired tomorrow but we will see. My goal still remains to be to improve the base of time and miles that I am riding. Then as the weather warms I will be able to add shorter more intense workouts back into the mix to build speed. As I build the base I will start with 1 minute efforts and then build them a minute at a time until they reach a 5-10 minute mark. Once I reach those times then I can continue to increase the intensity of those intervals. All while still riding a higher base set of miles each week. At least that is my goal.

Food was excellent yesterday with a 300 calorie deficit at the end of the day. Keeping calories up while in the build phase is helping to not be sore the next day. Plus I am timing the carbs later at night which has helped me ride all of these rides during the week in a fasted state. Then on my weekend rides I am sure to fuel up before and during the rides. I believe this was a key ingredient to the improvement I saw on my 40+ miles on Saturday. I kept checking my Garmin bcz my power was so high compared to what I was expecting it to be. aaaahhhhh the power of carbs!!

Food today so far is going well – lots of fresh fruits and then beans and a potato for lunch. I’m kind of a sucker for beans with potatoes – I throw some hot sauce on them and bam – high protein, high carbs and low fats. Plus I get a ton of fiber from it as well, which helps for feeling full. Still holding steady on weight even with the increased time on the bike – but I did eat almost 3500 calories yesterday and almost 4000 the day before – yum!!!

This was the mantra today over and over in my head, just keep spinning along. I was trying to stay down in Z2 for the ride but after two days off my legs were itching to stretch out and blast a bit. I was able to reign myself back in a few times and I never really opened it up today. 90 minutes of Z2 with a few moments of Z3 thrown in.

It was a warm morning today, near 54 degrees and after my warm-up I was ready to go but after digging myself into a deep hole over the weekend with 2 1/2 hours most all of it at a tempo pace. I might want to explain what I mean by deep hole – I use training peaks to track my accumulated training loads each week. It does a pretty good job of tracking and letting me know when I have pushed myself for too long a period without enough rest. This weekend topped off a higher volume week last week than I normally ride. So I took a couple days off to recuperate. Today I had some fresher legs and was ready to go – hold on there big guy, there is a number of training days still to come this week.

Nutrition wise – yesterday was a disaster! Work travel days tend to be tough but I was doing well all the way until dinner time then I just started eating too much – the dinner was healthy but the vegan cookie with peanut butter smeared on top just wasn’t at all. Ugh – I was super tired and very hungry when I started dinner then I just gave in! I find myself doing this once in a while when I am really tired. Yesterday was that day. But back on the mend today. Luckily my weight wasn’t too effected other than having too much sodium last night and retaining water my weight was stable this morning – down 9lbs. from my high back in June.

So my warning to all is to keep hunger in check when possible by realizing what your trigger times are and trying to manage them as best you can – without bashing down a peanut butter smeared vegan cookie!! Sheesh!!

Strength is a key factor in cycling better. Today I hit the gym for some weight work and some interval running.

I do just a full body workout centered on key multi-joint exercises.Pull-ups, squats, and bench press and the main ones and then variations off them on other days. I keep the sets moving from exercise to exercise and in-between sets I run 3 minute intervals at a pace faster than my 10K pace. Right now that is only at 9:30/mi. but I’m working on that.

Once the main set work is complete – 3 or 4 sets then I add in a couple of sets of shoulder press, bicep curls and some abdominal work as well to round out the day. I eat right after the workout – I like a shake made with #Orgain protein powder as the base then I add a bit once in a while. But it gives me 21g of protein, 14g carbs and 5g of fat. I like adding .5 scoop of cytomax to it as well for additional carbs to push the nutrients into my muscles faster. Then I round out with eating a decent breakfast. 1cup organic oatmeal, 1tbs of organic hemp seeds, 1oz. organic craisins, 2 tsp of organic agave. Great all through the full macro profile and has the staying power to fuel me for a couple of hours at least.

Tomorrow I will be back on the bike spinning out more Z2 time as I try to build a very wide base of miles to start to get back to higher functional power numbers in the future.